


english countryside - 08.25.17

by nihilist_toothpaste



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Introspection, M/M, because apparently that's all i can write
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-18
Updated: 2017-09-18
Packaged: 2018-12-31 03:35:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12123666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nihilist_toothpaste/pseuds/nihilist_toothpaste
Summary: dan and phil take the train back to london from edinburgh - a tale in three parts





	english countryside - 08.25.17

**Author's Note:**

> phil talks about the train journey to and from edinburgh [here](https://youtu.be/nm3SX4KAvG0?t=5m13s) (until 7:00)
> 
> dan talks about the journey [here](https://youtu.be/2GQI29wfCz4?t=30m8s) (until 31:05)
> 
> @danielhowell [tweeted](https://twitter.com/danielhowell/status/901142376596549632): "when your hairstyle has its own hairstyle @AmazingPhil" (Aug 25, 2017)  
> _
> 
> i decided to look up the train route that dan and phil described so adoringly and realized the most common route from edinburgh has three distinct sections: the first bit travels the coast, then it cuts through the northern moors, right through york, and finally the midlands, before returning to london. this fic was sort of born out of me thinking about those landscapes and geographies and the stories i might associate with each of them. 
> 
> [playlist](https://open.spotify.com/user/leelagroovez/playlist/5QbKV8xUxu8LEqCPFs5MKD) of music mentioned (also ordered/timed roughly to match the pace of the story if you want to listen while you read) 
> 
> thanks to dizzy for the constant love and support <3

**i. north sea**

The journal is leather-bound and stiff with disuse, as he pulls it out of his bag and presses it flat against the plastic table. Dan had seen it in a bookshop in February and thought it was beautiful.

This year would be about intentionality, about chronicling, reflection—he’d decided it as far back as July last year in the thick of touring. Standing in the middle of Waterstones seven months later, having ducked in under the pretense of escaping the wintry weather and perhaps to look for something new to bring home for Phil, he’d found himself running his fingers over crisp unlined pages and soft brown leather binding.

It’s nearly September now and the year has flown by in a whirlwind of—well, nothing, he thinks. How can he consider _any_ year a whirlwind after the last two? The accolades run through his mind in swift succession: book one, book two, published author, _New York Times bestselling_ author, stage show, musical number, touring, three continents, two movies.

His head hurts.

There will likely never be another whirlwind like it, he knows.

But this year’s been more than they’d dreamed. There’s the new place, the new upload schedule, the reconnecting with old friends and their families, the conventions all over the world, the pitch they’d slaved over—a pitch that had stagnated, because sometimes things just happen that way.

Amidst all of this, Dan had opened the journal exactly three times.

But now, it’s hardly past six in the morning the day after their panel in Edinburgh, an event quite unlike any other they’d done so far in their careers, and Dan feels like writing.

The train is quiet and nearly empty, silence interrupted only by the quiet clicking sounds of Phil trimming frames and snipping video as he edits away on his laptop, seated across the table from Dan.

Dan takes a moment to let himself watch Phil with his head bent close to the laptop, hunched in the position that is most certainly responsible for the now permanent curvature of his spine. He feels that familiar surge of annoyed admiration for Phil’s work ethic. They’ve been on the train for less than twenty minutes. By minute eight, Phil had already begun making the disgruntled noises he makes when he’s feeling restless, and pulled out his laptop to get some work done.

Dan can’t really understand it, has never quite wrapped his head around the notion of keeping a scattered mind occupied with something productive like work. So he pulls out the journal from his bag, stares blankly at the empty page and then turns to stare out the window.

The world is still dark but he can just make out the stretch of darkness that is the North Sea directly outside their window, stretching onward to the horizon, shadowy and oppressively massive in the half-light.

There’s something about the sea, he thinks. Something about the vast emptiness of it, the quiet, the cyclical regularity of the tide. All of it makes him feel small, and not in the liberating everything-is-pointless-which-means-everything-is-equally-meaningful sort of way. He’s not quite afraid of the sea, in the way Phil fears the unknown of deep waters, but he hates the way it dwarfs him.

It’s gorgeous though, so he stares out at the abyss for some time, transfixed.

He eventually breaks out of his reverie and turns his gaze to the still blank page of his journal, chewing on his lip as he considers what he’s feeling, what he wants. As he’s thinking, he can sense Phil’s gaze on him and glances up only to find Phil’s eyes darting up and away to the ceiling.

Dan fidgets a bit, feeling oddly insecure. This is not something he does, really. As much as he fancies himself a Thinker, it’s probably strange for Phil to watch him staring out the window blankly with a journal in hand.

He feels the back of his neck grow warm, thinking he must seem exactly like the fake deep self-serious wankers both of them love to drag. Phil gives him plenty of shit as is for his general tendencies towards sometimes forced profundity, but unironically journaling by hand whilst staring at the sea is definitely on a new level.

His heart rate picks up a bit as he steadfastly stares down at the page and wills himself to get over it. It’s just Phil, after all.

Just then, Phil’s foot bumps against his under the table and Dan looks up again, only to find Phil avoiding his gaze, staring resolutely at his laptop screen. Dan understands: Phil is showing him that he’ll respect Dan’s privacy, an unspoken reassurance that he won’t look or watch if Dan doesn’t want him to.

He still feels a bit dumb, but he thinks he will never be prepared for the way Phil knows him. He leaves his ankle intertwined around Phil’s, rubbing up and down his lower leg a bit, watching as a tiny smile appears on that lovely mouth and the icy blue of his eyes stay fixed on his screen.

Smiling himself, Dan picks up his pen and fiddles with it as he stares out the window again.

 _what do you want?_ he writes down a few minutes later.

He traces over the jagged edges of his penmanship and considers the question.

He feels the warmth of Phil’s ankle against his own, and after a moment or two, scratches the question out.

 _what do you have?_ he writes instead.

He’ll start there.

**ii. moorland**

They’ve just passed through Newcastle, nearly two hours into their journey, when he’s hit with a wave of bone-weary exhaustion. in typical fashion for them, they’d decided to mostly skip sleep, given their 6am departure time. His eyes feel leaden and sore now. He steps gently on Phil’s foot under the table, interrupting the focus he’s been maintaining on his editing.

Phil looks at him, quirking an eyebrow.

“Gonna try to nap,” Dan whispers.

Phil just nods.

“Can you wake me in like an hour?” he asks. “Don’t wanna miss the whole ride.” 

Phil nods again and turns back to his screen, rubbing Dan’s ankle softly with his own.

Dan leans back and puts in his headphones, letting his mind fade out to some strange ambient album Phil had been obsessed with last month. There’s nothing like a melody he can identify as the first track swells into being. Just sustained notes, veering gently off in so many directions, weaving together slowly as the track progresses. He normally can’t stand ambient music—needs his music to tell him stories or make him feel things—but it’s perfect for lulling his mind into blissful quiet as he lets the shimmering soundscape consume him.

He’s just begun dozing when he feels himself being kicked gently but repeatedly in the shin. Jerking upright, he stares at Phil who blinks owlishly back at him.

“Sun’s properly rising now,” Phil murmurs quietly. “Sorry. I didn’t think you’d want to miss it. 

They’ve left the coast behind, and Dan blinks the sleep from his eyes as he looks out across the dull green fields of dry heather and bracken swathed in the light mist of morning. The sun is just starting to break the horizon. Phil’s put his laptop aside and is turned completely in his seat to take the scenery in, headphones on and skin veritably glowing in the gentle peach-gold of dawn.

Dan just watches him a moment. As if he’s ever had a choice.

Phil turns to him and smiles, pulling back one ear of his headphones. “You should listen to this with me.”

He pushes his phone across the table at Dan and Dan swipes open to see he’s listening to the _Final Fantasy XV_ soundtrack. Ever since they’d both played the game, the soundtrack has been on constant rotation for both of them, and for Phil especially.

Dan presses pause and then back on the track on Phil’s phone so that it’s set to play from the beginning, then hands the phone back to Phil. He pulls up the soundtrack on his own phone and skips forward to the same track.  

“Ready?” Phil asks.

Dan nods and they make eye contact for a second.

“Now,” Dan says.

They press play at the same time.

The song opens with the gentle lilt of a piano hook, and Dan smiles. He’d tried to sound this melody out a few weeks ago while Phil was trying to snooze on the sofa in the lounge and he wonders if Phil remembers it. The song is comforting and warm and he loves it.

Phil has left behind the soft ankle rub of before in favor of full on trapping one of Dan’s ankles between both of his legs, and Dan can’t believe they’re sat here, after nearly a decade spent knowing and loving each other, still listening to video game music, still playing footsie under tables.

He’s smiling fit to burst as he looks out the window and watches the day being born.

They sit like that for some time, just watching the landscape go by, letting the soundtrack carry them, until Phil pulls his headphone back again about a half hour later, leaning forward against the table separating them and breaking Dan out of his hazy stupor in the process 

“We’re right near York, you know?” Phil asks.

Dan raises his eyebrows. He didn’t know, but it makes sense for how much time has elapsed.

“I know we just drove through here a couple years ago for tour, but it feels … different somehow,” says Phil. “I’m just thinking about it a lot for some reason.”

Dan is hit with the force of that. A couple of years. A couple of _years_. He feels winded with the passage of time.

“Like, maybe back in 2015—I was still thinking it’s kind of nice to be back near my first independent home. But now, I just—don’t feel that? I’d be a stranger here—and that’s all I can think about.”

Phil’s voice is so low and resonant, and he’s talking in stops and starts, the way he does when he’s not had time to plan exactly what he’s trying to say.

Dan thinks he understands though. It’s odd to think of this place as Phil’s home, just under a full decade ago. But then, it’s odd to think of any of Phil’s homes before he knew him.

“It’s just been a lot,” Dan says softly. “We’ve done a lot. Changed a lot maybe? Even just this year. So it’s like you’re even further away from this place.”

Phil stays quiet, considering 

“Yeah. It must be that. I can’t even really conceptualize uni Phil as a person anymore. I know what my coursework was, I know my friends, but I don’t really know who I was then. What did I want, you know? What did it even feel like to call York my home? Why didn’t this bother me when we were writing or when we were here last?”  

Dan stays silent, knows those are questions only Phil can answer, not really meant for him.

Phil sighs and rubs at his eyes a bit. He suddenly looks much older than he is, sleep deprivation dragging at the corners of his eyes, darkening the soft circles beneath them.

They hardly ever talk like this. There’s rarely a need to put into words the evolution of feelings that they both always seem to experience in tandem, seem to know and feel in the deepest parts of themselves: places where language can’t reach, where words feel superfluous.

For Phil to then choose to talk about it, Dan thinks, could mean that this is something he fears Dan might not understand about him, no matter how hard he tries to communicate what exactly he’s feeling. And with reason: Dan doesn’t feel attachment to any of his homes as physical locations before Manchester, before Phil. Dan doesn’t fear growth or change, he craves it, views it as a sign that they’re doing things, keeping in motion, moving up.

But he recognizes Phil’s fears in an instant and tries to show Phil he understands, even if he can’t empathize.

“You don’t really need to remember or know that stuff, right?” he asks after a while.

Phil just looks at him tiredly.

“I just mean, you don’t need to conceptualize uni Phil,” Dan says slowly. “And it makes sense that you’re struggling to do that, really. You’ve only gone and become world famous, with your brand deals and your fancy panels with Sue Perkins and half of British television’s elite. And all the daddies in like ten separate countries and several subsets of the global entertainment industry want you.”

Phil laughs out loud at that and kicks him under the table.

“Hate you,” says Phil, mouth twitching. He’s silent for a beat as he seems to consider what Dan’s said. “You’re probably right. Not about the daddies. Just about the—stuff. Also I’m making this sound all bad, but it’s not. It’s just strange … and different. We were so over our heads when we were here last, and now we’re not. We’re not, right?”

“Nah,” says Dan. “It’s like, we’re settled or something, in a way. We’ve gone and done all of it and now we’re … calmer. I dunno. I think it’s good though.”

Phil just looks at him, a corner of his mouth quirking up in that crooked smile that Dan finds so painfully endearing. They’ve both still got one ear of their headphones on and Dan’s sure they must look absurd right now with their tired faces and unkempt hair, staring stupidly into each others’ eyes. He couldn’t care less.

Almost as if to underscore the vast gulf they’ve apparently crossed since those waning months of 2015 that Phil is remembering, Dan reaches over and squeezes Phil’s hand in his, lets his fingers brush back and forth across the soft smoothness of Phil’s palm. Phil doesn’t even flinch, just squeezes back for a moment, then loosens his grip, letting Dan pull away.

They go quiet again for a few minutes, and then Phil turns to rummage in his bag. He pulls out a small white cardboard box and pushes it across the table towards Dan.

Dan opens it and finds a slightly deformed blueberry muffin.

“I ate in the hotel’s coffeeshop before you were up this morning,” says Phil with a shrug. “Brought this back and figured you’d be hungry around now.”

He turns to look out the window again before Dan can say a word.  

Dan reflects, finds that he definitely is hungry. He shouldn’t be surprised that Phil knew before he himself did. He rubs Phil’s ankle with his foot again in silent gratitude as he takes a bite of the sweet.

His mind returns to his journal, and the pages he’d filled during the first leg of this journey, adrift in his own thoughts about where they’ve been, how far they’ve come, and the nauseating terror of stagnation, complacency. He thinks about how Phil feels it too, but differently, in his own way.

But stability is not stagnation, he thinks, as the taste of blueberry bursts across his tongue. Nor is contentment. They’re letting themselves learn this.

**iii. hillside**

Shockingly, Phil does fall asleep after another ten minutes or so. Dan thinks he must not have slept at all last night if he’d had enough time to eat and shower and find Dan a muffin, all between their decision to sleep at 2:30 am and Dan waking up at 5.

Dan leans forward to grab Phil’s laptop from where it’s resting on the seat beside him. He knows Phil will insist on emails and a whole slew of other administrative tasks once they’re back home and thinks he can help make some headway now, so that Phil can rest tonight.

Every so often he glances out the window to find the muted greens of the northern heaths giving way to the lush hills and pastures of the midlands. Small lakes and ponds dot the countryside, and the sun is out in full force over a crisp August morning.

He’s halfway through the newest Perfume Genius album and ironing out the details of an agenda for next week’s big conference call with the team when Phil starts to stir. Dan checks the time to find they’re about 30 minutes outside of London.

Phil groans a bit as he comes to and stretches his arms out above his head, eyes squeezed shut against the bright sunlight streaming through the window.

Shaking himself a bit he smacks his lips together and looks at Dan. “I fell asleep,” he says, matter-of-factly.

“You did,” says Dan, glancing up and then back down to continue working on his email.

Suddenly he looks up at Phil again, and then starts to laugh in full force. “Oh my god—oh my god, don’t move,” he says, giggling and whipping out his phone. 

Phil just glares at him in sleepy confusion.

Dan zooms in a bit to frame the upper part of Phil’s face and snaps a photo.

“Oh my god, Phil. Look at your hair. It’s like your hair has its own hair.’

He pushes his phone towards Phil across the table.  

Phil maintains his glare as he looks at the photo but Dan can see him biting down a smile.

“Absolute babuse,” Phil says and pushes the phone back towards Dan with an air of perfectly feigned distaste.

“I’m posting it tonight, just because you said that.”

“I hate you.”

“Hate you too. But also the world deserves to see the artwork that is your hair." 

“Let me see it again.”

Dan gives the phone back to Phil, watches as he zooms in and out on various parts of the photo. His expression is serious. Dan sighs a bit, and he knows what’s coming.

“You sure about posting it? Do you think they’ll be able to tell anything from the background?’

“No, Phil,’ Dan says heavily. “If you’re worried, I can crop it really tight. But who cares? they already know we’re taking the train. and I’ll post it once we’re back home. It’s fine.”

Phil stays silent for a beat and then glares at Dan again.

“Still hate you. Can’t believe this is the treatment I get.” He’s looking down at his phone now, clicking through to something Dan can’t see. “And to think _I_ was thinking about posting _this_ picture.”

Dan’s eyebrows arch in surprise as he takes Phil’s phone. The photo is of him in profile, face soft and settled, illuminated by the light of sunrise. his headphones are on and he’s looking out at the landscape, unaware he is being photographed. 

‘No you weren’t,’ Dan says exasperatedly.  

Phil just looks at him.

“Were you?’ he asks, voice gone a bit quiet. He doesn’t quite believe it.

“Maybe,” says Phil simply. “Maybe in one of those series you know, since I took a lot of photos of the scenery. Dunno.”

His voice is remarkably even, as usual, and Dan tries to settle the squirming in his stomach. He remembers the last time this happened, all the way back in Singapore. But Phil hadn’t told him in advance then, and Dan had ridden that high for days after, the surprise of it, the incomparable feeling of Phil showing the world, however subtly, the way that he sees Dan.

He knows Phil has snapped plenty of arty and scenic photos of him since then, some of which Dan has stolen for his own posting purposes, but there hasn’t been another instance like this, where Phil has suggested he wants to post any of his photos of Dan to the public, on his own terms.

“Why?’ Dan asks, lowering his gaze a bit and fixing Phil with his most persuasive stare. “Why did you feel like posting it?" 

Phil just rolls his eyes at him. 

“No really, why?” Dan asks again. He doesn’t know why he needs to hear Phil talk about this.

“Your narcissism is getting worse with each passing day, Howell.” 

But his face has gone a bit pink and Dan so rarely gets the chance to wind Phil up like this. They’re settled in their understanding of their attraction to each other, there’s no need for Phil to tell him—but sometimes Dan just wants to hear it. He’s only human.

“Do you think I’m _pretty,_ Phil?”

Phil crosses his arms in a huff as he resolutely avoids Dan’s gaze.

“I thought the view was pretty, but you thought I was prettier?” and he’s full on laughing now.

Phil groans. ‘You’re awful. Maybe I just want recognition for the fact that I’m definitely so much better at taking photos than you are.”

Dan’s eyes widen in faux outrage. “That’s a fucking lie and you know it.”

“You never take nice photos of me,” Phil says, and he’s very nearly whining.

“Phil, I try my best, but you know it’s not my fault that you don’t know what to do with your face in photos.”

It’s a play fight they’ve had so many times, but Dan honors it all the way through, contorting his face into Phil’s classic deer-in-headlights expression, followed by the definitely-pained grimace, and then the over-exaggerated smirk. 

Phil’s poker face breaks and he lets out a laugh, full-bodied and warm, filling Dan with light. Phil reaches across the table and shoves Dan’s shoulder hard enough that Dan flops backward on the seat back.

“Ouch, you twat,” he says, the potential heat of the statement made marginally less impactful by the wide grin threatening to consume his face. His cheeks physically hurt from smiling.

“Babuse,” says Phil again, and then they’re both snorting.

Dan rubs his shoulder dramatically for a bit longer, and Phil wraps his leg tenderly around Dan’s again, turning to stare out the window for a bit. 

"It's so nice seeing so much green," he says, then turns back to meet Dan’s eyes.

Dan says nothing, and Phil just looks at him. Dan feels his own cheeks start to color.

Phil had really considered posting that photo. Dan knows he probably won’t, knows he’ll save it in drafts, look at it a few times, and maybe end up deleting it. But he’d considered it. Dan lets the reality of that wash over him again.

“Stop staring at me, perv,” Dan says after it’s gone on a bit too long. But he’s loving this. Something about their leaving home always gets them flirting in this way that still feels brand new every time.

Phil doesn’t look away.  

“Love you,” he says all of a sudden, and it throws Dan. He wasn’t ready.

He widens his eyes theatrically and then buries his face in his arms, slumping over onto the table.

And then Phil’s fingers are in his hair, running through the curls near his ear, lingering there and running softly back and forth. To anyone watching it would just look like his hand was resting on the table between Dan’s head and the wall.

Dan swears he can feel Phil’s lingering questions through his touch. Dan knows he’s itching to ask about the journaling, that he instinctively worries about Dan and the moods he gets into. He knows that he’s still afraid that they don’t share the same fears, that there’s always the fleeting possibility of Dan being unable or, worse, unwilling to listen to him.

They’ll have plenty of time to talk and keep talking, to stretch this conversation in bits and pieces over the next few weeks. But for now, Phil is turning to affection, the way he always does, the immediate reassurance through touch and glance and whispered words that he’s here and will be, always.  

Dan turns his head slightly and lets his lips brush across Phil’s fingers. He keeps them there a moment and then buries his face in his arms again.

He feels Phil’s leg tighten around his under the table in response.


End file.
